In recent years, the need to prevent leakage of information, and to detect leakage and trace a leakage route when such leakage of information has occurred, is increasing. This need arises from the fact that leakage of confidential information never seems to end. As for ways of information leakage, a user can carry out paper documents which are physically copied or printed out, or can carry them out as digital data in many cases. In companies, public offices, and the like which handle confidential information, security is enhanced to give top priority to avoiding information leakage. However, such information leakage is often done by insiders. Furthermore, information processing techniques and network techniques are progressing remarkably, and security techniques that are secure at the present time may even become obsolete soon.
Furthermore, office devices such as digital copying machines in recent years or the like, or a printer, scanner, and FAX (facsimile) device, have a function of digitizing paper documents and a print-out function of printing digitized documents. Also, they have a simulcast function to a host and devices connected via a network. These functions have advantages for the user of removing the boundary between paper documents and digital data and of providing advanced functions and convenience that exploit the network function. However, transmission errors of large-sized data may occur due to a user's simple mistake, and it is even more dangerous if such functions are exploited maliciously. If information leakage of some kind is confirmed, it is indispensable to specify the outflow source or route of that information, and to take preventive measures.
In a case where information leakage has occurred, means for tracing and specifying a leakage route/source of that information (this function will be referred to as an archive function hereinafter) is required. The same applies to not only the leakage source and outflow route of physical paper documents but also those of document data and the like which are digitized by being scanned by a scanner. Tracing means for documents which are converted to digital data and can be easily transmitted via a network or public line is strongly demanded. For this purpose, office apparatuses such as a copying machine, printer, and the like, as input/output devices of paper documents and digital data, are required to have document tracing capability that can achieve the above object. By familiarizing the public with the fact that the copying machine, printer, scanner, and FAX monitor all documents to be input and output, a suppression effect against information outflow and easy copying and transmission by domestic users is also expected.
As prior art for implementing this archive and document tracing capability, Japanese Patent Laid-Open Nos. 7-212602 and 2001-45275 are known. According to these references, all printed data are stored in a storage device while appending information to the data about users who printed out the data. When outflow of document data has occurred, stored information is searched based on an image of the document corresponding to the document data, or additional information, so as to specify the output user and the route of the document data that has flowed out. In such a device, when the storage device that archives data is full of data, new operations are inhibited until a server extracts archive data from the storage device, so as to prevent any archive omission. Furthermore, in order to capture output data that is output to a device which itself has no function of archiving data to be output, an arrangement is realized in which data is transmitted in advance from a host to an archive server which archives the data, and then the data is transmitted from the host to the output device upon transmitting data from a driver on the host to the device. The driver on the host has a function of transmitting data from the host to the archive server. Especially, as for data printed or transmitted via FAX from a personal computer, by introducing a driver which is compatible with such archive function, all images can be archived even in a user environment that includes a printer and FAX which have no archive function.
However, in an environment in which devices with and without the archive function, or drivers with and without the archive functions, are present together, the following problems occur.
If data is output from an archive-function incompatible driver to an archive-function incompatible device, that data is omitted from those to be archived. A method of inhibiting drivers other than the archive-function compatible drivers from being used, and avoiding such omission by management, may be used. However, when a malicious user installs an incompatible driver or brings in a personal computer to print data, such print data is not stored in the archive server, thus forming a loophole in terms of the archive function.
When an archive-function compatible driver outputs data to an archive-function compatible device, both the driver and device archive that data. Hence, both the driver and device unnecessarily hold identical data. Especially, on the device side, the data storage capacity that can hold data is more strictly limited, and when an archive storage area becomes full of data, that device cannot operate until the archive server collects data. Such waste increases the down time of the device.
Furthermore, a case will be examined below wherein the user who wants to use a printer, FAX, or the like from an information processing apparatus such as a PC (personal computer) or the like, in which no archive-function compatible driver is installed, transmits data to a device which has no archive function. In such a case, since the device side determines that data is transmitted from an archive-function incompatible driver, it cannot accept a print or FAX job. In this case, a bona fide user cannot determine how to use a print or FAX function if there is no means to know why that user cannot print or transmit data even if he or she wants to execute it.
Furthermore, upon reception of a print or FAX transmission instruction from an archive-function incompatible driver, a device having an archive function itself archives that data. After that, the device outputs the archived data to the archive server, thus providing the archive function to the user. However, when the archive-function compatible driver is used, since the archive storage area of the device can be used more effectively, it is not efficient for the user to keep using an archive-function incompatible driver.